Public administration: concepts, theories, and applications

¶ … public administration with considerations on the characteristics of organization and management in government centering on the impact of political processes and public pressures on administration action, role of regulatory agencies, governmental personnel and budgetary procedures, and unique qualifications of a public administrator. From the past as the paper indicates there has been increased interest in public administration in to whether they fulfill their obligations as expected (Rabin et al., 1998). As government should create the appropriate environment for public administration rather than adapting to them, it shows how politics results from social status and culture limitations (Peters, 2007, p. 92). The paper further illustrates that regulatory authorities are independent institutions, their roles revolving around developing policies, implementation and even judging creates vital political deeds. In government budget procedures, program heads remains key components as they end up determining the eventual outcome of government projects. On the qualifications of a public administrator, they should enable the individual to develop, implement, and monitor policies in bettering public service (Stillman, 2009). Public administration as a vital component in social service, there should be no compromise of external influences affecting service delivery as this ends up deviating attention from the intended purpose.

Public Administration

Introduction

By the start of the 21st century, public administration research and practice has been experiencing vital scrutiny concerning managing premises as well as the capacity to undertake its mandate and fulfill its expectations that led to its creation. The public administration history provides a strange composition of happenings and individuals that greatly contributed to the field. Public administration also has great significance in the governance of the society. In addition, it will come apparent to many that assessment of public administration will be appropriate mostly in involving the political and administration organizations (Stillman, 2009). Thus, to understand history of public administration well, it will be well done by examination of the evolvement of models of public administration which typically discusses governance evolution. The models also indicate the changes in how authorities manage conflicts and rule the society. The history credits Christian theology in how it explains origin of sin showing how the power of the public should be shared to eliminate individual temptations with opportunities at their disposal. In addition, the nature of how power is acknowledged in a country will indicate how sharing power through certain governmental structures provides the checks and balances that determine public administration is achieved and finally, anticipation of how public conflict in public bodies affects public administration (Rabin et al., 1998, p. 40). In this regard, research in this field will interest more on whether any changes in any public institution is fulfilling the demands of the society and whether the research itself is one way or another helping in finding solutions in democratic ways. Public administration as a vital component in social service, there should be no compromise of external influences affecting service delivery as this ends up deviating attention from the intended purpose.

Impact of political processes and public pressures on administration action

Public administration as a sphere of control which has the obligation of being action-oriented and performing which should interest researchers in inquiring whether bureaucracy and democracy can be compatible and if so under what circumstances. In addition, they question what creates the basics of contemporary society (Stillman, 2009). In this regard, it then brings to conscience the aspect of public institutions from where public administration is executed. In these public institutions, the government has the obligation of creating certain environments rather that adapting to them as public administration depends on the vision of the society as well as the political influences thus the institutions responsible for public administration has to be "conceptualized as institutions rather than instruments" (qtd. In Peters, 2007, p. 92). These institutions in addition has the capabilities of creating and implementing command laws that identifies the game play, the illegible participants, what they aim to achieve, available penalties in case of violation of set standards and most important the procedures to implement any necessary changes (Morrison, 1996, p. 493). For this to run smoothly there should be a democratic government which should have an appropriate understanding of the political characters and their actual ways of executing tasks.

Despite there being a consideration that the new institutionalism understanding is viewing the older possible solutions that can bring about valuable changes and management of public administration as incapable, it understands that politics forms a very vital constituent of the society and is typically a result of the aspects of social class, culture or population change. In addition, reductionism assumes as a necessary condition that political characteristics are exhibitions of simply individual characters where the performance of any public institution will best be explained by what individual bureaucrats do. Moreover, as public administration will entail utilization of public resources, the economic utilitarianism will reflect the conduct of certain personalities as selfish individuals rather than driven by public interest (Stillman, 2009). Therefore, for a successful public administration, performers/functionalists will use the past evolution as this dictates the type and character of institution that will best be compatible with surroundings where the weakest is eliminated from the organization. Because politics should fulfill the role of satisfying the distribution of scarce resources and that it ends up influencing government spending, it should do so with the best interest of the public rather than selfish gains. As much as symbolism, traditional understanding, and regularly observed procedures greatly affect politics and administration, and as much as public institutions can enjoy self-governance in execution of their duties, political processes should not be allowed to take control of their running as this greatly impacts the pressures put on public administrators in their obligation of satisfying the public (Peters, 2007, p. 92).

From the above, it is apparent to serious observers to notice that the science of reasoning can present a false impression meaning whatever takes place in public institutions does not necessarily imply that they are genuinely doing so in favor of public interest, as unconditional or even in clean sense, will be hard to legally enact (Stillman, 2009). Therefore, the results will be that public administrators will be inclined to making decisions that are dictated by certain principals or standard judgments of fulfilling which will generally compromise the reality of the problems they are facing as well as the unfolding of such difficult times as the times they happen to be so.

To help in acknowledging the necessary roles of policy making in any public administration, realistic goals that different departments will follow, the manner in which communication takes place, favorable chances and assistance created as well as the capacity to choose or make decisions are major aspects to consider. From the above, one can notice that it is through avoiding confrontations, risk mitigation, solving problems to help answering difficult situations, organizational education helped by prior acquaintance of the public administration profession and binding rules and regulations are potential compositions in decision making. This is because in public institutions where there is public administration, decision making mostly match political spheres as authority matters and game play dictate how policies are made and implemented (Stillman, 2009). Thus, mostly the common perspective of an administration can be difficult to match personal motives calling for the need to put in place necessary procedures and guidelines to manage different characters to fit in the expected framework that will ensure checks and balances exists in the extend to which politics can interfere with public administration. This is because for instance, politicians are short-term players and they may fail to be more concerned about public satisfaction. This can then result to public pressure due to inappropriate maneuvering of performance hence failing to fulfill the public in terms of managing them. It then leads to eventual consequences of poor decision-making as politicians fail to be responsible to their duties in legislating thus affecting service delivery as there is no total control in management rendering public institutions passive and freedom of choice lacking consensus.

As public management/administration is a result of human activities rather that implemented technology, there will always be conflicts in the process. In addition, public administration institutions will never be managed through sincere reasoning because it has happened many times where the administration have initiated changes and failed to see them through, simply because, reformers are bounded by the limits of reasoning like for instance in the Western European countries who saw the need to join forces in establishing viable solutions to public administration (Peters, 2007). However, in public administration there are political leaders who can pronounce distinctly national importance and at the same time remain within the acceptable limits of leadership to properly relate policy making and implementation well hence able to offer, strong and basic foundation and influence having national interest.

In the manner in which the politicians get to office also raise questions creating public pressure on their authenticity to perform and whether they will not affect administration performance. Irrespective of whether educated/trained or not, the politicians are bound to thinking ethically and politically as far as the challenges that they face are concerned. One time or the other, these elected legislatures will find themselves in difficult situations that call for difficult ethical decisions in the processes of performing their duties just as public administrators and as some can mange such trying moments, others will fail to perform. These public administrators should ensure that they have proper interaction with the government/authorities so as to understand well how they function in the quest to establishing reliable solutions that are potential managers of public pressure to finally ensure that public action is not compromised (Stillman, 2009). For example, in the last twenty years, the pressure exerted on public administrators has been "more entrepreneurial, to find ways to do more things and new things with fewer resources, to be nimble in response to fluctuating problems and demands, has been acute" (Cook, 2007, p. 243). In addition, considering the pressure on public administration coupled by increasing global changes as well as intensity and lack of efficiency in responding, majority of governments have failed to reform their laws to match the ever changing demands in public administration hence affecting decision making and the eventual public action/response.

Role of regulatory agencies in public administration

Regulatory agencies as independent government agencies/commissions created by legislative law so as to manage standards in particular fields, undertakings within the private sector faction and implementing those set standards, are vital politic deeds and have various authorities in rule making, monitoring and power of controlling, judging as well as implementing approval on certain aspects. In addition, they start on domestic levels in implementing certain processes, taking part in pre-as well as extra-legislation consultations and being part of parliamentary debates (Stillman, 2009). Nevertheless, the role of regulatory agencies has for a considerate time being under researched irrespective of their freedom from executive scrutiny, as far as public administration is concerned. However, there exist varied views on the already done research on regulatory agencies. Some argue that extend of open-mindedness and privatization is limiting the freedom of political character while others insist on regulation change that regulatory agencies utilize (Encyclopedia Britannia, n.d.). For instance in Europe, especially the Western sides, the regulatory agencies are planning to incorporate all aspects in different countries to help in improving reputation in policy making.

From the great concern on performance of regulatory agencies, they have a significance task to perform in influencing political decision-making procedures with specific interest to particular sectors. It is thus the obligation of the regulatory authorities to have the appropriate technology and professionals so that they can willingly pass any necessary information to help in making viable policies. In addition, regulatory authorities as powerful institutions that have varied capabilities in performing, they should ensure that they meet their targets and then as they are independent agencies, they are able to offer good reputation in political procedures thus legitimizing certain political procedures. All in all, questions still erupt on extend to which these independent institutions influence policy making, at what points they have great influence, and the explanations of the potential tasks in policy-making. Recent studies indicate that majority of Western nations have started delegating political authority from government to other institutions that have no direct responsibility to the citizens. These institutions are regulatory authorities who form a crucial part in political decision-making ensuring that they remain authentic as they are under thorough scrutiny. They play a vital role in both the process of policy making especially during the initial stages as well as in the implementation processes. Therefore, regulatory agencies will compose a certain type of political character that helps in policy making processes with unique tasks. They are also influenced by the administration culture that exists outside statutory limitations and then association between the regulatory agency and the regulated sector can at sometimes affect the intended role in decision making (Maggetti, 2007).

Government personnel/program heads and budget procedures

For any governmental budget to be successful there has to be program heads who ensure that they express clearly and precisely the budget formulations and be on the look out for any deviations from the set spending. It all revolves around the fundamental aspect of consideration that governmental budgeting forms a vital component in decision making process and that this consideration gives motivation to government departments to participate in an organized operational structuring for some short-term in future in how best they can utilize the limited available financial abilities within all necessary and competing government projects (Kinnersley, and Magner, n.d.). Therefore, the resulting final budget that a government adopts seeks to allocate resources within various government units and gives authority to maximum utilization in all areas allocated. The budget thus relates the financial resources and personnel/staff character with a main goal of achieving the set unit policy overall goals.

There are two different factors in any government budget. These are the formal budget processes and budgetary processes in implementing fairness and these two affect significantly the budget personnel stakeholders in terms of their ways of thinking and acting (Kinnersley, and Magner, n.d.). As key players in government budgeting, program heads/personnel remain close accomplices in budgeting as well as in implementation and mostly concerned with the outcomes of budgets. This is because budget programs will significantly affect individual rewards, regardless whether material or not, different people will experience varying psychological challenges depending on the weight of the matter. For instance, program heads with huge allocations of the budgets have greater chances of realizing higher rewards and whenever there is a realization that more resources better performance, rewards then associate with performance. In addition, psychologically, huge budget allocations offer great motivation such that program heads/personnel can feel as achievers in an environment where there is competition for the limited financial resources. Moreover, they can enjoy esteem status from their subordinates as capable individuals in effective use of program resources. However, there are instances when program heads can experience psychological difficulties in accepting their budget allocation realities and this can lead to creation of negative modes of reasoning and characters. For instance, when there are extreme constraining factors that greatly challenge their status as budget maximizes, program heads will exhibit rebelling characters.

On the other hand, there are instances where a government can find itself in a compromising situation with limited financial resources ending up in less allocations that contradicts program heads' expectations, they end up being affected psychologically because they have a believe that they should receive the lion share of the budget. This is in addition created by the budgetary procedures which can end up raising unwanted responses from the program heads. With regard to this, majority of program heads will have great concern on whether allocation procedures and amounts were made fairly and in a transparent manner. To manage this, the formal budgetary procedures fairness will assist in ensuring that budget decision makers remain compelled within the expected consistent procedures with personnel standards of judgments remaining proper. That is, "people often have stronger reactions towards the fairness of decision making procedures that they do toward the favorability of the decision outcome" (Kinnersley, and Magner, n.d.).